Vicksburg Massacre: White League Kills 150-300 Black Citizens, Overthrows Sheriff

An estimated 150-300 Black citizens and two white citizens are killed during the Vicksburg massacre, a coordinated campaign of white supremacist violence that begins on December 7, 1874, and continues until around January 5, 1875, in Vicksburg, Mississippi. The massacre follows the forced resignation at gunpoint of Peter Crosby, the county’s Black sheriff and tax collector, and represents a systematic effort by the White League to destroy Black political and economic power in Warren County. When Black citizens march to the courthouse on December 7 seeking to reinstate Sheriff Crosby, armed white mobs open fire on the mostly unarmed group. White supremacist squads then roam the county for weeks shooting unarmed Black people and conducting door-to-door searches of Black homes to confiscate firearms.

The violence targets the most threatening aspect of Black political power: control over taxation and public spending. In 1872, Peter Crosby was part of a Black political group called the Vicksburg Ring that took control of city politics. On November 4, 1873, Crosby was elected sheriff of Warren County, making him the tax collector for the region. As Vicksburg’s Black leaders begin spending tax money on Black education, white residents become infuriated. The acquisition of land by Black Mississippians prompts the most prosperous white landowners to take action. The White League, falsely accusing Black leaders of corruption, vows to “redeem” local politics—meaning to drive Black officeholders from power and restore white political and economic supremacy.

On December 2, 1874, members of the white Taxpayers’ League meet at Crosby’s office and demand his resignation. When he refuses, the group returns with six hundred white men armed with pistols and rifles. They surround the Warren County Courthouse and force Crosby’s resignation at gunpoint. Five days later, when Black citizens attempt to peacefully restore Crosby to office, a second white group opens fire, beginning the massacre. President Grant sends federal troops to Vicksburg and Crosby is reinstated as sheriff, but the restoration proves temporary and largely symbolic. White deputy Andrew J. Gilmer refuses to follow Crosby’s orders, and when Crosby tries to remove him from office, Gilmer shoots the sheriff in the head on June 7, 1875. Gilmer is arrested for attempted murder but never brought to trial. Crosby survives the shooting but never makes a full recovery and must serve the remainder of his term through a white proxy.

The Vicksburg massacre gains national attention as it highlights the willingness of white supremacists to violently resist Reconstruction and destroy Black political power. The violence and intimidation tactics soon enable forces antagonistic to racial equality to regain power throughout Mississippi. The massacre establishes a pattern repeated across the South: Black electoral success triggers coordinated white violence, federal intervention temporarily restores order but cannot be sustained indefinitely, white supremacists regain control through a combination of terrorism and legal manipulation, and perpetrators face no prosecution. The events in Vicksburg demonstrate that the fundamental conflict of Reconstruction is not primarily ideological but material—white elites will not tolerate a tax system that funds Black education and development, viewing it as an intolerable transfer of their wealth to support their former property. The successful overthrow of Sheriff Crosby proves that control over taxation and spending represents the ultimate prize in the battle over Reconstruction, prefiguring the “taxpayer revolt” rhetoric that will recur throughout American history whenever multiracial democracy threatens concentrated wealth.